PALESTINIANS were hit by more Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip today, further raising tensions created by Israel’s new far-right government.

The Israeli military said that the morning raids had been retaliation for a Palestinian rocket attack in southern Israel.

The air strikes targeted a Hamas rocket production workshop, according to the military, which added that the site contained raw chemical materials.

There were no reports of casualties.

Israel’s air defences intercepted a rocket attack from Gaza on Wednesday night, the military said.

In Israel, local residents reported hearing explosions, but the country’s rescue service said it had received no reports of injuries except for a 50-year-old woman who had slipped and fallen while running to a shelter.

The action came after Hamas warned Israel over National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s threat to subject Palestinians held in Israeli prisons to harsh treatment.

Mr Ben-Gvir said the new rocket fire from Gaza would not stop him from implementing his punitive policies against Palestinian detainees. He called for an urgent security cabinet meeting to discuss a response.

Israeli-Palestinian violence has spiked in recent days, even as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited the area and called for calm.

Last week, Israeli soldiers killed 10 Palestinians in a military operation in the West Bank.

The next day, a Palestinian gun attack on an east Jerusalem Jewish settlement killed seven people.

At the weekend, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy wounded two Israelis in a separate East Jerusalem shooting.

Israel reacted by approving a series of punitive steps against the Palestinians, triggering condemnation from the international community.

Amani Srahneh of the Palestinian Prisoners Club, which represents current and former prison inmates, blamed the “escalatory measures and this new Israeli government’s policy of inciting against prisoners” for creating “a very tense situation.”